


Of Diamond Cages and Happiness Charms

by Silicu (silmil)



Category: One Piece
Genre: Ace needs a goot shove in the right direction, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Families of Choice, Fire, I put WAY too much thought in world building for a oneshot, M/M, Marco is slower than he could be, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Thatch is a bit lost as to what to do with those two, lots of them - Freeform, thatnk god for Robin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-11
Packaged: 2018-04-08 16:16:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4311906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silmil/pseuds/Silicu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They begin in a charred-black meadow, standing on different sides of the bars of a diamond cage. Then there's fire, a mark, solutions, a miracle, happiness, loneliness, and a dark elf. They end with a happiness charm, but it's the best kind of end - the one that heralds a new beginning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Diamond Cages and Happiness Charms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lunarshores (damichan)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/damichan/gifts).



> Ok, so _this thing_. This thing got away from me, really :D I shouldn't try doing fantasy AU's because DAMN, I couldn't fit half of what I thought up for this world in it AND IT STILL FEELS LIKE THERE'S TOO MUCH WORLD BUILDING IN IT! GAH! I explained some additional things in the notes int he end, you'll find the little numbers where the information fits in the text!
> 
> Yes, this is actually a birthday piece for [lunarshores](http://archiveofourown.org/users/damichan), cause she's just that awesome and deserves it, and might have mentioned she likes fantasy AUs :D Thank you for the warmest welcome to the fandom I could have asked for and have a wonderful birthday!

The Whitebeards were widely recognized as a very strange family. That was in no small way due to the fact that one could hardly find two creatures within it who were actually blood relatives. And, while adoptive families were common around their lands, most tended not to stray outside their race when forming.

The Whitebeards were as varied as the world allowed. Fae called elementals their kin, humans lived alongside shifters, even Whitebeard himself was an actual old-time god whose Pantheon had been torn down by years and most of his fellow gods losing their worshippers1.

Not that anyone really knew that. Well, _Marco_ knew, and sure, a lot of his older siblings _suspected_ – it was hard to miss the fact the old man could literally shake the ground beneath his feet at a whim – but no one else really _knew_. Edward Newgate had abandoned his old position and fame to form a family, and in it he had found the most loyal worshippers – his children. With their support and unending faith, he would never fall like his fellow gods of old had.

Marco took pride in this fact and made sure to extend his own faith completely to the aged deity not because he truly trusted in gods – no one could live as long as him and _really_ trust immortality and omnipotence – but because he believed in _Edward_. In Pops.

Marco didn’t have a father of his own. Many legends were concerned with his birth, but it had been so long ago he himself didn’t know the truth any longer. The one thing he knew was that he was one of a kind, and that he wasn’t quite what everyone believed him to be.

Marco was a phoenix. Not, as he had allowed the world to think, a phoenix _shifter_ , no. Unlike shifters who were either born to shifter parents and possessed the ability at birth, or were originally human2, Marco had lived millennia as nothing more than a phoenix.

He sometimes still thought of the old days, when he would soar in the sky until his wings went weak, only to dive into a volcano to replenish his depleted energy, before flying off again. It had been a wondrous existence, but it had been so very _lonely_.

The thing was, Marco wasn’t _just_ a phoenix. He was, and as far as he knew had always been, the _only_ phoenix in existence. Many legends of his kind circled the world, but Marco could remember being there for the birth of every single one of them.

He might have once had parents, but they were no longer there. He might have once had blood relatives of his own, but something must have befallen them. Although, what that might be, was a mystery, as nothing seemed capable of ending _him_.

On most days he just considered himself a whim of a fanciful god. That was the only reason he walked among all other creatures now, after all.

Pops had been the one to give him this, long ago when he still sat on his high throne among other gods and clashed swords with Zeus for entertainment. Back, when he had been at the peak of his abilities, he had found Marco bathing in a pyre, and he had offered the phoenix a partnership. Marco had spent decades perched on his shoulder, flaming tail burning gold where it was intertwined with Pops’ blond hair. He’d learned to shape human languages in his throat, and he’d learned how to act like a creature of this world, not like an anomaly of it. Until the god had asked him, “Would you be my son?”

That day he had stood on two shaky human feet for the first time, and as he’d cast a look at his changed body in the mirror, he’d smiled. There, on his chest, had been the proof of Whitebeard’s power, the mark of his protection. It was the evidence of their bond that even Marco’s healing flames could never erase from his skin.

He was the first, and oldest, of Whitebeard’s sons. And since that day, he had never again been alone.

Of course, the Whitebeard family had grown spectacularly over the years. With so many immortal species intermixed with generations of humans and halfs, there was no wonder they only seemed to grow stronger as the centuries passed.

And even their short-lived companions were easily on par with the fiercest mysticals. Marco supposed it was the sheer amount of magic they were exposed to daily – be it the healing of the nymphs, the mark elementals left as they walked the ground, or the residue when shifters switched form for the sheer joy of it; the humans in the Whitebeard family grew to be some of the most powerful mages walking the land.

Which was why he was rarely so desperately needed as he was now.

“So, the kid just goes up in flames, imagine that! Like he’s not standing in the middle of _Vista’s forest_!” Thatch rambled on, gesticulating wildly. “I swear to you, the nymphs would have skinned him alive by now if they could get close to the firecracker!”

“How come you haven’t just locked his fire in, eh?” Marco asked as he followed him between the trees. “I don’t remember you having any compulsions against crippling elementals when they piss you off,” he added, just barely managing to keep the disapproval out of his voice.

Thatch was the most powerful mage alive that Marco knew of. He’d been born in the family, his mother a half-nymph who’d arrived bearing a man’s child and begging for protection. She’d ran off shortly after and left the child behind, an act that had grated on Marco’s nerves to such extent that he’d almost chased after her. Pops had nipped that disaster in the bud by handing him the newborn and telling him to raise it.

To this day, Marco really didn’t know where he’d gone wrong in that, but Thatch was very unrepentant when it came to using his spectacular abilities. There had been a betrayal a few years back – a night elemental who had been their brother for centuries had tried to murder Thatch in his sleep. The mage had somehow managed to twist Teach’s power into itself and left him a useless twitching mass that Marco had happily sank his talons in.

Thatch might often be an ungrateful bastard, annoying and very uncaring about personal boundaries, but he was Marco’s brother, as close as Marco would ever have to a son; and Teach had deserved nothing less than death for turning on their familial bond.

That experience had left Thatch unhappy with most elementals, especially outsiders to their kin, so when he’d called Marco in to _‘get this fire runt to calm down’_ , the phoenix had been understandably confused.

“Yeah, but Pops wants to adopt this one,” Thatch whined, as if being denied the pleasure of turning the kid’s abilities inside out was a grievous offence. Marco would have to address this soon, before Teach’s betrayal brought even more suffering to their family.

They finally reached a clearing where the forest itself seemed to have withdrawn from the structure in the middle – Vista and the nymphs had apparently done their best to keep the trees out of the circle of destruction; and a cage made of diamonds sparkled surrounded by much charred ground. As they broke through the undergrowth, a burst of flame rushed from between the sparkling bars and headed in their direction, causing Thatch to mutter a shielding spell, and take a couple steps back just in case.

And Marco, well. Marco hadn’t had the pleasure of meeting a fire elemental since Roger and that had been a long, _long_ time ago. Not even that redheaded salamander in the East could produce flames quite like those of an elemental.

Even as the source remained still a bit away from him, the flames that wrapped around his body were powerful and enraged, trying to burn under his skin and char his bones. The familiar play of fire over his nerves made excited thrills run down his spine, and he took it in, absorbed the heat and the destructive potential, he let it sink deep inside him and chase away the lethargy of his days. A contented hum built up in his throat and he very quickly forgot about Thatch as he headed towards the heart of the vengeful flames.

The cage was beautiful and deadly, its bars sharp and hard like something only Jozu could build from scratch. The form inside was literally spitting fire, his hair and clothes smoldering as another burst of flames encircled Marco in a burning tornado.

Feeling energy sparkle all the way down to the tips of his fingers, Marco smiled at the trapped man. A man, yes, but just barely. He had constellations of freckles over his cheeks and eyes like charcoal. And his fire was so very invigorating, so wild and feral. Indeed, it reminded him of Roger.

Since the fall of the King, fire elementals had been hunted and more often than not killed for his sins. It had gone so far that most old bloodlines were now eradicated; no sort of protection could save them from the fear of both people and mysticals alike. There had been rumors that a pureblooded human boy had manifested fire elemental abilities3 close to ten yeaors ago, only to be beaten to death by his own village. Well, at least that was what most people thought, but Marco was fairly certain Dragon had rescued the boy and taken him under his wing, metaphorical as well as literal.

Seeing that his attacks had no ill effect, the man took two steps until he stood just on the other edge of the bars and bared his teeth at Marco.

“Fucking let me out!” He spat, his shoulders burning in agitation, fires left dancing in his footsteps.

“No one’s keeping you in, eh,” Marco replied unfazed by the angry display. The man might be powerful, but he needed control. It was very possible he didn’t even know what he was doing, aside from lashing out. There would have hardly been anyone to teach him, after all. “If your fire can get out, then so can you.”

The elemental snarled and punched the cage between the two of them. His fire flared where the diamonds cut into his fingers before the injury could settle and Marco smiled.

“Just like that, eh.”

The fireuser seemed to halt for a moment, looking at his hand in suspicion, then confusion, then contemplation. His face moved with every following emotion, his thoughts written so clearly over his features Marco might have been reading a book.

Then, in a flash, flames burst between them once more. But this time it wasn’t a hurled fireball aimed out and away, this time the inferno twisted around the man’s arm, growing hotter and brighter, until the heart flashed a brilliant white. Then the fire shifted up, another spark inflaming his other hand, and within bare moments the elemental’s form was engulfed, a small localized pyre burning where he’d stood.

And then, as if blown by a gust of wind, the mass of fire moved, shifted forward and between the bars like it was slipping along a path of dried grass and not blackened, empty ground. Marco considered making a step backward to give him space, but there was something so alluring in the moving inferno, something that spoke to a part of him that was much older than his rationality. He felt his own skin itch with blue flame and swayed even closer into the heat source.

Moments passed, and the wild fire had completely cleared the cage, but there was no hint of the man rematerializing, and Marco considered the heart of the flames for a moment. If his past experience with elementals was anything to go by, the man was completely aware, but unable to find his more stable form. Marco could probably talk him through the process, but there was something sparking under his own skin like it wanted to break free. So he decided to lead by example.

Shedding the human skin Pops had given him so long ago, he spread his wings and stretched them into the pyre, blue flames intermingling with red. He could let himself drift like this, fire and heat and life all around him, the exhilaration enough to send his heart pumping so fast he felt it might beat out of his chest.

But there was something else in the flames: a burst of emotions he could hear like the pixies listened to the songs of rustling trees. There was a struggle and uncertainty and a sharp sense of panic that made it all burn even hotter around him, and he made an effort to get back to what he was supposed to be doing.

He focused, trying to speak to the flames through his own, wrapping blue fire around his shape and then shifting, remembering, drawing a human form with his fire and letting it flicker in the heart of the red flames, towering over his smaller body.

There was a beat of confusion, a spark of determination, and then the blazing inferno that surrounded him shifted with intent, fire rearranging itself to a smaller area, a shape taking form in the blazing heart of it.

Shifting his body back reluctantly, Marco let his flames slowly sink back into his skin, and watched with fascination how the fireball seemed to collapse into itself and a very dazed-looking man stumbled until he regained his balance. His eyes blinked and a look of complete astonishment overtook those expressive features.

Marco smiled. He might not be an elemental, but there were definitely things he could teach this man.

\------------------

Not half an year later, Portgas D Ace – and yes, Portgas, like Portgas D Rouge, like Roger’s little-known half-elf lover4 – accepted Pops’ protection and named himself Whitebeard’s son. The mark on his back was one of the most beautiful things Marco had seen.

\------------------

The thing with Ace was, he somehow managed to be the solution to all of Marco’s problems the moment he stopped being one of them. It had been hilarious, really, bringing him the first time to Pops only to have the man dissolve into flames and hurl himself at the laughing deity. Well, it had been hilarious for the phoenix, at least, because he remembered how Pops used to take him on casual strolls through active volcanoes in their early days.

But once Ace settled, once he accepted his place among their mismatched family, once Pops’ mark bloomed dark on his back, he was set. He’d made his mind and there was nothing that could keep him away from his family any longer. He’d plunged into the depths of the forest to meet every last pixy, even gone on a swim with the sirens and water sprites on a number of memorable occasions. One of them had always had to drag his half-drowned ass out eventually, but it proved to be a shockingly effective trust building exercise.

Ace became a permanent fixture in everyone’s lives so suddenly and completely that Marco almost got whiplash. He was open and sociable and even polite on occasion. He listened to everyone, and sometimes he’d go to Marco and mention the problems that had been shared with him, and generally keep him in better touch with the family than he’d been able to be in quite a few centuries.

And then there was Thatch. Thatch, who never really listened to Marco anymore. Thatch, whose trust issues with elementals had become almost legendary, and still he refused to talk to Marco about it. Thatch, who might have snuffed out Ace’s fire with no remorse if Pops hadn’t forbidden it.

Ace somehow managed to grow on Thatch like moss on a shady stone. As soon as he’d accepted Thatch as a brother, he’d seemingly made it his priority to ensure the mage would like him. The fact that it worked didn’t really surprise Marco, but as time passed he noticed something more.

Ace’s closeness was healing Thatch. Weather he was cauterizing the gaping wound with his very presence, or helping to melt the man’s heart with his charm Marco wasn’t sure, but it was _working_. The last time they’d met an elemental Thatch hadn’t volunteered to take care of it, or really expressed any interest in the whole thing. It was a noticeable improvement from the man who had tried very pointedly to be the one dispatching elementals on their way for years now.

Last, but not least, Ace managed to occupy Marco’s free time like no one else. He had decided to give his best shot at training the elemental, even though he himself didn’t quite possess the same abilities. Ace was smart and caught on fast, though, so there was little he needed to be worried about. What’s more, when he couldn’t understand what was tripping the elemental up, all he had to do was listen to his flames to find the issue.

Ace’s flames were the most honest part of him. When Marco would lean in and open his mind to their voice, it was like seeing inside the younger man, nestling into his heart and feeling everything he did in bursts and spikes. Ace felt emotion so very powerfully that every last bit of it translated to his element unerringly.

But that was easy to understand, because Ace _was_ fire. Marco knew many elementals who had, consciously or not, incorporated their element in their personality – Jozu could be as sharp as a diamond when provoked, and it was rare to meet someone quite as fluid and adaptable as Jinbe. But Ace didn’t just pick out some characteristics to stick with, he was fire incarnate.

On good days, he was a bonfire, throwing light and warmth right into the hearts of his family. He smiled and laughed and generally had the time of his life so honestly that even the most sullen of their siblings would find themselves unwillingly drawn in. He lit their entire land with his presence, like a light offered by a god to keep the darkness away.

When angered, Ace was unmanageable. It was a stark reminder of his first months among them, when he wouldn’t let the glower drop for anyone. And he angered so _easily_ – like a summer wildfire sparked by no more than the burning sun. He could take out entire forests if he were left to his own devises.

And when his family was threatened, well. When his family was threatened, he turned into _Roger_. It was beyond his easily sparked anger, beyond destruction and devastation. When his family was threatened, Ace was a natural disaster – unstoppable and uncontrollable, a pyre so hot it could reduce everything in the vicinity to ash.

Watching him face Doma that one time had made Marco realize – this. _This_ was why the world had learned to hate and fear fire elementals. It wasn’t _what_ Roger did, but _how_ he did it. It was the unstoppable desolation his flames would leave behind – an empty, dead, barren field where there had been centuries-old trees that no catastrophe had been able to tear down. Ace could be _exactly_ what the world had feared when they’d set off to hunt down every fire elemental they could find –Roger in a world that _hated_ Roger.

Sometimes Marco wondered what would have become of the man if he hadn’t been accepted into their family. If, after all his efforts to kill Pops he had succeeded, or if he’d sought out to burn his anger on someone less accepting. He wondered about the kind of monster Ace could have been, if he hadn’t stepped into Pops’ realm.

He tried not to, though, and Ace made it easy. He made it easy when he smiled – wide and bright with exhilaration, soft and warm with kindness, sly and secretive with mischief, crooked and arrogant with pride. He made it easy when he danced in a circle of nymphs only to have them breaking up and running away with how bad he was at it. He made it easy when he was so very _happy_.

But it wasn’t until half a dozen years later that Marco realized that he’d never _really_ seen Ace happy. It was only when, entirely out of the blue, Dragon had passed through their lands. And Dragon wasn’t alone. There was the fire elemental with him, the newly manifested one that Marco had heard of time and time again: floppy blond hair and, peculiarly enough, a burn scar on half his face. Marco was curious about him, but knew how to restrain himself – he had no interest in provoking Dragon, and the shifter could be notoriously territorial.

But then, as Marco was escorting the duo to meet with Pops before they continued on their way, Ace stumbled out of the woods and _froze_. Marco had never seen the man so still in all the years he’d known him – Ace was a fidgety, inpatient being, too full of energy and enthusiasm for his own good like a constantly flickering flame. At that one moment though, there was nothing about him that was moving. He was a point of stillness, of complete lack of motion – Marco wasn’t even sure he was breathing at _all_. And then,

“Ace?” the newcomer asked, shocked. “What are you doing here?”

And the words seemed to shock him into motion. He took a sudden step back as if struck, the herbs he’d been carrying slipping through his fingers. His shoulders and back flickered aflame, then extinguished just as suddenly. His face lost all color and his mouth slackened, and-

“Sa-sabo!?” The name fell from his lips, and Marco _understood_.

He understood, because he knew the story of the mark on Ace’s arm: that the scratched out S was not just a misspelling, but a failed binding spell. Ace had thought he’d been late, but if _this_ was Sabo, then no wonder he hadn’t been able to link them together – the spells that work on dead souls couldn’t affect the living.

The blond elemental smiled shakily and he started apologizing, saying how he couldn’t come back, “because they saw me, Ace, if I ever came anywhere near you they’d figure it out, and I couldn’t just lead them to you and Luffy and-” but he didn’t get anywhere, because Ace was throwing himself at him, wrapping his arms around his neck and _laughing_.

“Shut up, _shut_ _up_ , I don’t care, I’m just so so happy to see you _alive_ you _stupid moron_ ,” he managed between breaths, choking on laughter and tears, and Sabo clutched him so tight there were flames licking up from where his fingers dug into Ace’s back.

That evening Ace was brighter than the sun, all boundless happiness and exhilaration, hanging on every word his brother spoke. Dragon had agreed to stay the night after his elemental had turned wide blue eyes on him, and the two brothers didn’t seem to notice anyone but each other. The party had been spectacular, but there was nothing Marco would remember more fondly than their sparing session afterwards.

Ace and Sabo had ditched what was left of the gathering not long after midnight and relocated to the charred rocky grounds that Marco used to train Ace regularly. The following fight had painted the night sky with the vibrant orange, red and yellow of a sunrise and provided the partying bunch with the most spectacular fireworks they could have asked for.

Marco himself had slipped away from the proceedings, drawn in by the spectacle of their flames. He’d stood to the side, far enough not to intrude but close enough to watch them go at it, and it had been the most impressive and captivating sight.

Being both elementals of the same kind, there was really not much actual damage they could deal to each other, but that didn’t stop them from doing their very best. Ace’s attacks, now that Marco had been working with him for years, were much smarter than they had been when they’d first met, but Sabo didn’t fall behind, demonstrating some of what must have been Dragon’s techniques. They turned the ground ablaze with every charge, dancing through each other’s flames and turning the other’s attacks against him.

Taking his eyes from the spectacle proved to be difficult for a very long time, but when Marco actually managed it he noticed Dragon, reclining against a pile of heated stones in the middle of the disaster ground of their battlefield, unfazed by the all-out fight happening just meters over his head.

Marco wondered, what it was in elementals like these two that could bring some of the most powerful mysticals to their side. There was Shanks, a second generation salamander shifter and a mage to boot5, who had become the master of the East. And yet Marco remembered him young and impressionable, all but worshipping the ground Roger walked on. He considered Dragon – the first and only successful dragon shifter that Marco knew of – a firebreather on his own right and a self-decided loner who had left his flesh and blood son to someone else to care for. And yet he had somehow decided to take this man and raise and train him, to keep him by his side.

He looked up into the burning sky and thought, what about Ace? Ace, who was for all intents and purposes a child in comparison to Marco. He thought of him worming his way into the hearts of their siblings, he thought of him helping Thatch, he thought of him in battle. Ace, with the few short years he’d lived, who was in no way Marco’s lesser. Ace, who, now that he considered it, Marco thought of as an _equal_.

Was it only their power that brought such attention? Or was it how they always seemed to burn brighter than life?

When, finally, the two elementals exhausted themselves and crashed to the ground in a heap, quiet words shared under a star-filled sky, Marco left his perch and allowed them their privacy. But he didn’t go back to the party, instead circled the area and ensured the two wouldn’t be disturbed. They needed all the time they could get, after all.

As promised, Dragon left the next morning, and Sabo dutifully followed him on whatever business they had. Even bidding farewell to his brother, Ace’s smile was wide and joyful.

“I’ll go find Luffy,” he said as they were heading off. “He’ll be so happy to know.”

“Wish the kid the best,” Sabo smiled back, and waved one last time.

Ace left the very next day in search of his brother, and Marco didn’t see him for two months. And somehow it wasn’t the sheer joy he’d felt at the elemental’s happiness that made him realize what had been brewing under the surface, but his absence.

For two months, Marco’s life went back to how it had been before he stepped into that charred meadow and stared into fierce black eyes. He went back to what had been his routine for so many centuries now, surrounded by family that loved and respected him and standing by Pops’ side like it was second nature.

But, for the first time since he’d become Whitebeard’s son, it wasn’t _enough_. He felt alone again.

The dinners he shared with his closest kin, a universally merry and chaotic affair, couldn’t keep his thoughts off of the Ace-shaped hole in the proceedings. He made considerable effort not to let his mind and heart drift, but there was little in the conversations that could grab his interest. He started losing track of it easily, so he remained mostly quiet while he feigned attention and longed to hear Ace’s voice raising with everyone else’s.

The very forest seemed darker and duller around him, like Ace had taken the colors of their home away, together with his presence. And without Ace to chase over the rocky fields for training, Marco found himself at loose ends. He tried interacting more with the rest of his family, but too often the conversations would slip away from him and the activities would lose his interest.

He realized at some point that Thatch might be right when he said he was moping, so Marco decided to stay away from him too. Suddenly, he knew exactly what it felt like to want to keep something to himself because he needed to figure it out on his own, and he silently apologized to his charge for pushing.

When he ended up sleeping most of his days away, he tried telling himself it was because he was more tired without Ace’s flame to fuel him, but the lie was so weak he couldn’t even make it sound believable to his own ears.

He’d never felt the lack of someone else in his life quite this badly. There was a constant longing for Ace’s voice, his company, his fire, his laughter, his very existence. It colored everything around him a dull grey, like a curtain pulled over the world that only Ace knew how to lift. It finally occurred to him, in the deep of night when an owl shifter perched beside him in quiet company, that somewhere along the way, he’d fallen in love.

When Ace finally returned to them, it was like the sun rising after the longest night. Pops sensed him from miles away, and Thatch pulled one of his rare teleportation spells to join the elemental for the last part of his journey. Little over an hour later, standing on the edge of the forest, Marco saw them closing in, grinning ear to ear and excitedly filling each other in on the time they’d spent apart, and…

And the sun seemed to gleam off of Ace’s bright smile, to sparkle in every shiny accessory, and in that moment he was _beautiful_. But he was also gorgeous in the way he strode forward, confident and unburdened, the mark on his left arm, now a proof of his brother’s continued life instead of his own failure, having lost its weight. His dark eyes sparked with amusement and lighthearted teasing and if he’d been happy before, he was _radiant_ now.

Marco’s chest constricted strangely, but not painfully, because now that Ace was back in his line of sight, there was no pain that had any meaning. He felt the tension of the last couple of months just disappear as if the elemental’s very proximity was melting it away. He smiled widely, and when the duo was close enough, called a greeting that was enthusiastically returned.

Their family didn’t even wait for night to start the party. Thatch actually pulled out that pouch of rare spices he’d collected a while back on a trip to the west, and with the help of the fauns managed to whip up an entire feast. All matter of mysticals arrived with more food and drink, and as Ace finally got seated in the place of honor right beside Pops, they all urged him to tell them _everything_. This was really the first family celebration since the miraculous return of Ace’s brother, and now that talking about him made the man smile broadly instead of quieting down, they wanted to hear all about it.

Ace, on the other hand, was more enthusiastic in sharing about his little brother and the spectacular crew the kid had managed to attract to himself.

“I swear to you, the guy has to be at least part banshee6! The way he screamed when I went all flamey, it was impressive!”

“… and where on Earth he found a dark elf, I have no idea! I mean, I thought there weren’t any left after the whole Ohara disaster, right? You should have seen her though, Thatch, she was _gorgeous_!”

“And Luffy’s gotten so strong, the damn brat. Did I ever tell you how he tried being a mage when he was 10 and ended up turning himself all rubbery? Apparently it still hasn’t worn off!”

The party didn’t stop with the rise of dawn, and proceeded late into the following night. In all honesty, the last time so many of their siblings had gathered to throw a party quite like this one had been when Thatch had successfully completed his immortality spell7. The resulting celebration had dried up their good wine reserves spectacularly, and this one was well on its way of doing the same.

At some point Izo had grown annoyed with Ace for one thing or another and glamoured him to sleep, and with their main guest of honor out for the count, the party had finally ended in the darkest hours of the night. The night-dwellers had offered to help everyone else to their usual beds, while Marco had chosen to remain beside the fire for just a little bit longer.

On the other side of the flames, Ace was snoring easily, a smile on his face even in his sleep, and looking at him, Marco knew everything was just as it was supposed to be. There was a feeling of rightness, of knowing this moment was perfect and nothing could break it, that spread through his veins as he basked in Ace’s radiant presence.

“Wher’ did th’ party go?” The man asked a little later, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

“I think some of them drank themselves to an early grave, eh,” Marco smirked at him as Ace sat up across from the flames, and his grin warmed the phoenix more than any fire could.

“Oh, yeah? Too bad they won’t get to see my new party trick, then,” he declared and reached to untie a pouch from his belt. “I was gonna show this to everyone, but I wanted to try it out for myself first before I did.”

“You didn’t try it on your way here?” He asked, amused and curious.

“I was in a bit of a hurry,” Ace grinned sheepishly, and Marco thought maybe he’d missed them as much as they’d missed him.

“What is it, eh?” Marco asked, peaking over the campfire to see the inside of the opened pouch. There was glistering powder inside that caught the flickering light and reflected it in colorful flashes.

“Just something Robin, the dark elf one, gave me. It’s supposed to be a happiness charm masked as a pretty light trick,” he drew a few nonsense shapes in the fine dust with the tip of his finger. “But she has this peculiar sense of humor that can’t _possibly_ be healthy for everyone around her, so I’d rather try it out before I declare it to everyone and end up just spilling some dirt into the fire or something.”

Dark elves had always been known for their powerful charms, but most of the knowledge of how to make them had been lost with their entire civilization long ago. The fact that a survivor of that race would entrust a man who was all but a stranger with it surprised Marco more than he’d be willing to admit.

“Well, let’s see if it works,” Ace pinched a little between two fingers and shifted closer to the flames burning between them, before sprinkling it over the fire pit.

The fire flashed high once, and then returned to its original state, before a dark blue color bloomed in its core. It spread out in a circular pattern, and soon the heart of it was burning green instead. Then yellow, orange, red, purple, and blue again. The colors merged into each other, intermingling and flowing freely, until the fire pit was awash with a rainbow dancing over the flames.

Warmth spread through Marco’s chest, but if it was from the charm or Ace’s rapturous laughter, he couldn’t tell. The emotion intensified with every moment he kept looking into that freckled face leaning so close over the flames that they were flicking at the tips of his hair. Then, Ace looked at him, straight into his eyes, all the colors of the world reflected into his charcoal irises, and Marco found himself moving, closing in, helpless before his own desire.

He leaned over the fire, his face right there next to Ace’s, and as the flames licked against his skin their lips touched.

And when Ace didn’t pull away, when he pushed forward and kissed him back-

Something burst in Marco’s chest, something more powerful and more unstoppable than Ace’s fires, something more eternal than his own life. It engulfed every part of his being took him in and dragged him under, and he was gone, lost, drowning in it. It was emotion like he’d never felt before, one that transcended happiness, that overpowered joy, that went beyond euphoria and elation. It had him laughing into Ace’s mouth and looking into dazed, glowing eyes.

Pulling back just a bit, Marco offered:

“I guess there’s something to be said about dark elves’ charms, eh.”

And Ace crawled right through the fire pit spilling colored ambers and burning logs in every direction to climb into Marco’s lap. And as he pressed himself into the phoenix’s body, all flames locked under hot skin; as he wrapped ash-covered hands around the back of his head; as Marco felt the burning taste of fire filling his mouth and warmth engulfing his heart, he thought infinity had never looked brighter.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. On the question of gods: Gods have spectacular powers beyond those of any other mysticals, they can basically warp reality every which way they please. Only, there’s a but: a god is only a god if he has worshipers. The pantheons that used to rule the world ages ago collapsed when people and mysticals alike lost faith in them. What Whitebeard has now – a family that adores him as their patriarch, isn’t exactly what a god has, so he’s no longer quite as powerful as he’d once been (he’d even aged in the period between abandoning his post and finally gathering a big enough family to sustain him), but it’s enough to keep him alive and strong enough to defend them.
> 
> 2\. Shifters weren’t a naturally occurring species, until one day a human mage decided: _Hey, that’s a nice animal, I wonder if I can merge with it!_ The experiment proved to be successful, but it had an unexpected effect – the shift translated to the mage’s very genes, and her children also carried the ability to shift. Since then many people have followed in her steps, and shifters are now as much a part of the world as any other mystical. Mages powerful enough to be able to shift into mythical creatures are very, very rare.
> 
> 3\. Elementals, also known as humans who have control over certain elements, _are_ naturally occurring, but rather rare. Their abilities also get passed down through the generations, but unlike shifters they can’t be magically created. First generation elementals manifest at random, most often discovering their abilities during puberty.
> 
> 4\. Roger died over two centuries ago. Rouge, using some very powerful spells which had devastating effects on her body, froze Ace’s development in her womb for most of those two centuries, dying when she finally gave birth to him 21 years before the beginning of the story.
> 
> 5\. First generation shifters are almost always mages (except in the very rare cases when a mage would turn someone other than themselves into a shifter), but second generations and beyond have little affinity for magic. It isn’t impossible to train a shifter to use it, but one has to be very persistent and it’s generally too much bother. So given that there have been fewer and fewer new shifter bloodlines in the last centuries, shifters who are also mages are a rarity.
> 
> 6\. Yes, Usopp is, in fact, half-banshee.
> 
> 7\. One of the most risky and difficult spells known, the immortality spell, requires some very rare ingredients, and very specific knowledge and ability from the casters. If done correctly, it stops the caster’s aging and basically makes them immortal the same way most of the mysticals are. If not done correctly, it most often results in death, or in a few memorable occasions, in some very twisted type of immortality. Brook is one such example.


End file.
